


A Little Bit Like Sunshine

by leominoris



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Angst with a Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Underage Drinking, Lee Donghyuck | Haechan-centric, M/M, Set in Europe, in a legal setting but tagging for safety anyway
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-22
Updated: 2020-06-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 23:34:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,691
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24863896
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/leominoris/pseuds/leominoris
Summary: Bathed in the last rays of summer sunlight it was easy for Donghyuck to pretend this was all a dream.Renjun is leaving, Donghyuck isn't.
Relationships: Huang Ren Jun/Lee Donghyuck | Haechan, Minor or Background Relationship(s)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 45
Collections: Haechie Birthday Bash





	A Little Bit Like Sunshine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [YumeNoHoshi](https://archiveofourown.org/users/YumeNoHoshi/gifts).



> hello lo, and happy belated haechan day! so. turns out that i thought that merging two of your prompts would be a great idea so that's… what i did. i'm sorry for butchering them both in the process.  
> i've also seen quite a few dream aus set outside of sk and decided that i might as well write from experience and join the bandwagon! i did my best to explain cultural differences as simply as possible but there's a bunch of notes in the afterword to hopefully help too!
> 
> i proofread most of it but i also did it while sleep-deprived, so there's probably a bunch of mistakes in there regardless. please use them to. idk. feed the monsters under your bed. that's what i do with the typos i already found. the monsters under mine liked them quite a bit.
> 
> a big thank you to everyone who helped me get this baby written. i won't be naming anyone for the sake of anonymity but i hope you'll know when you read this anyway.
> 
> happy summer, stay hydrated and safe!

Bathed in the last rays of summer sunlight it was easy for Donghyuck to pretend this was all a dream. Waves lapped at his ankles as he and Renjun sat on the rocks overlooking the lake, the murmur of the water accompanied by Chenle's shrieks and Jaemin and Jisung bickering over something about fires and barbecue in the background.

It felt like just about every other lakeside get-together of theirs ever since the lot of them had found each other commiserating over the highly inauthentic "Asia Week" their school's canteen hosted every year. Bonding over European misconceptions of what Korean or Chinese cuisine tasted like had proven oddly efficient and Donghyuck, at the time thirteen-going-on-fourteen and friendless (by choice, he would like to emphasise, his classmates had been terribly boring) had thrown himself into the opportunity to have a dynamic circle of friends with a solid sense of what was good cooking.

They'd been scattered across different classrooms and years with Mark, Renjun and Jeno being one ahead of Donghyuck, Jaemin and Yangyang and Chenle and Jisung in the one after but little had it mattered once they had realized that their personalities, quirks and flaws and all, somehow all fit together like the pieces of a puzzle.

A puzzle now threatening to fall apart as adulthood slowly caught up and differing dreams started to pull them in all kinds of directions. For Mark that direction was across the sea, back to Canada where he'd spent the first few years of his childhood. Meanwhile Jeno would stay in the country but start his studies in the capital, roughly one hour away by train, in September. From what Donghyuck had gathered when he'd visited the open campus event it might as well mean going abroad with how busy he'd be.

And in Renjun's case a new direction meant Paris. It hadn't come as a surprise in any way, all of them had always known that Gobelins was his main destination, had been ever since around the time they met. It just had been so easy to brush aside when it had been a far-off thing – until it wasn't. Renjun had been determined to get one of the coveted 25 animation major slots that opened up per year and thrown himself into the application circuit with his entire body and soul. Donghyuck might've been a smidge biased but he would have been ready to fight the jury board if Renjun hadn't made it.

And now summer had come and the sixth-year fraction of their little group of friends was graduating and Renjun's complaints were no longer about juggling uni admissions with studying for his finals but about apartment-hunting in one of the most expensive cities in the world, having to take his French proficiency exam before he was thrust head-first into classes, finding insurance and opening a new bank account–  
The list was seemingly endless and every bit of it was a reminder that he was going places where Donghyuck couldn't follow him.

Instead, while Renjun would be boarding the TGV Lyria to Paris Gare de Lyon in a week's time his flight for the mandatory yearly visit to Jeju City was leaving in a little less than twenty-four hours. And once he returned Renjun would no longer live three tram stops away and be ready to come explore the city with him whenever they pleased.  
No more late nights by the lake, no pidgeon-spotting, no laughing at tourists and visiting Jeno at his part-time job at the fancy indie cinema.  
No overpriced bubble waffles in the shade of the trees right in front of the equally overpriced Globus department store, no more throwing each other into the river Sihl on days so hot that made the asphalt under their feet feel like it was blistering.  
Renjun would be gone until winter break and who knew what would happen to him, now that he'd have the opportunity to spend six months somewhere exciting and multicultural and _sophisticated_.

"I'll always come back," Renjun promised and stared fondly at the lake as if he'd never see it again. Something in Donghyuck stirred, ugly and sticky and spiky, burrowed itself under his skin.  
"Easy for you to say. At least you get to leave."

It was unfair. He knew it too. For Renjun, it had never been about leaving. But he wouldn't find regular employment in a big name studio here. Instead, it'd be freelancing, swinging from twenty thousand one month to nothing for three more. The industry was fickle and opportunities for stable work in the animation industry were sparse as things were already. No need to put himself at a disadvantage if he could help it.

Renjun had dreamed of this ever since he was fourteen and now, four years later, Donghyuck was turning that dream of his into a blade to keep him at knifepoint with.

"You know that I wouldn't if I had the same opportunities here!" Renjun shot back heatedly. Donghyuck was too much of a proud fool to take back his words.  
"Lucerne teaches animation too. No one's keeping you from going there."  
"Lucerne isn't Paris!"  
"Well, neither is Zurich! You were still just fine here!"  
None of Donghyuck's arguments made sense anymore but it didn't matter. Anger boiled between his ribs, searing and sour and ready to boil over, calling for him to hurt Renjun the same way his departure was hurting him.

They only noticed their voices had risen in volume when Jaemin interrupted them wordlessly. Donghyuck wished he'd take his side, after all, he was Renjun's childhood best friend. They'd grown up as neighbours. Surely he didn't want to lose his best friend to this fantastical idea of Paris where everything was better either, no?

"Jeno and Yangyang are back with the drinks," was all that Donghyuck got instead, a statement completely unrelated to the fact that Renjun was leaving and none of them could do anything about it.

Renjun was leaving and abandoning them.

  
  


☀️

  
  


Donghyuck swore he tried to make the best of their last evening together. He drank probably a bit too much beer and Mark scolded him, talking about how he wouldn't want to get a hangover on his flight. It'd be quite the story to tell his cousins back in Korea, how he spent most of the flight bent over the plane toilet but at least he was allowed to drink.  
He pictured Dongmyeong's admiring eyes like that fact was owed to one of Donghyuck's personal achievements and Dongju's unconvinced one because unlike his twin, his other cousin knew that it was really just a matter of the law.   
"Also drinking is overrated," had been the first thing Mark's older brother Taeyong had told them when they'd asked him about his first experience with alcohol.

Right now, however, the idea of numbing the anxiety of the impending goodbyes seemed like the perfect solution to all of his problems. Nevermind that he'd immediately tell his recently-teenaged little sister about how drugs and alcohol were never the answer if asked. The night was warm and comfortable and smelled of campfires and the marshmallows they were roasting over the fire. No better time to be a hypocrite.

He pointedly ignored Jeno and Renjun exchanging excited murmurs about how things would be once they started their studies.  
Donghyuck wondered how Jaemin put up with it, knowing his boyfriend was so excited to leave the city. Then again, Berne was an hour away by train and Jaemin had family in the same Canton to match his own Bernese accent.  
Distance would probably have nothing on their relationship even though they'd only been going out for a few months — officially, at least.

Renjun and Donghyuck weren't dating. Maybe that was the first mistake made here, maybe– no, no, no matter what, Renjun had always been destined to leave and maybe this was a testament to how he really shouldn't have picked up that second can of beer when he had. Donghyuck was being selfish and he knew.

  
  


☀️

  
  


"I'm sorry. About what I said before."  
"Hm?"  
"About Paris and stuff."  
"It's fine, Donghyuck."

  
"I don't want you to leave."  
"I know."  
"I wish I could come with you."  
"I know."

They sat on the bench by the tram station. The sky was clear and infinite and even through the haze of the city's light pollution, Donghyuck was still able to make out the Great Dipper and Orion high above their heads.

"I want to kiss you."

This time Renjun didn't reply right away. He tilted his head to the side instead, searched Donghyuck's face for a hint of _something_ much like he looked at the world as if there were a wonder awaiting at every corner. Thinking of it, maybe to an illustrator-slash-soon-to-be-animator like him, there was.

"You should've told me sooner."

Now it was Donghyuck's time to look confused. His mind was still fuzzy from the beers earlier.

"You were busy. And so was I. You're not the only one with a GPA to worry about."

Renjun laughed.

"If you'd told me earlier I might've let you."  
"Why won't you let me now?"

The tips of their noses nearly touched when Donghyuck leaned in. Renjun scrunched up his nose at what he presumed was his beer breath.

"Because if you kiss me now I'm going to cry myself to sleep and I told myself I wouldn't cry tonight."

  
  


☀️

  
  


The time in Jeju was easier than expected. Holidays in South Korea always meant going as soon as possible and returning at the last minute so the expensive tickets and long flights paid off and between being dragged around the island by his cousins and the numerous trips to Busan and the few sporadic WhatsApp messages in their group chat it was easy to forget that things would be different by the end of it all.

But once they touched down at Zurich Airport and finally collected their suitcases, far too heavy with too many things Donghyuck and his sister had insisted on bringing home, reality slowly started to settle in.

First, it was getting home and wanting to text Renjun to show him what cool stuff he got before realizing that Renjun no longer lived three tram stops away. Donghyuck called Jaemin instead just to spite– who was he trying to spite, really?  
It didn't really matter. Jaemin, who hadn't been in South Korea for years because his family didn't live there anymore soaked up all of his stories and told him about his own, shorter trip to Los Angeles where he'd been to see his own relatives. They talked about Mark and how they worried that he might accidentally get himself adopted by a Canadian bear (there was good reason Donghyuck never saw much of interest in majoring in biology at his lyceum, he couldn't be bothered to google what kinds of bears lived up there to begin with).  
Jaemin told him about how he'd helped Jeno move, how his apartment was tiny but got great daylight and was close to his university.  
They facetimed Yangyang just for the hell of it and laughed together about their graduation thesis ideas to conceal the fact that they were all terrified of finally getting to it.

All of it just to ignore the clearly Renjun-shaped hole in the space around them.

  
  


☀️

  
  


The year went by faster than expected, mostly because they all got unbearably busy and stressed. Renjun did not, in fact, come home for winter break. Instead, Mr and Mrs Huang took a train to Paris and promised Donghyuck they'd bring him the present he'd gotten Renjun in his wide-eyed, naïve anticipation. When he'd found out his first impulse had been to throw the fox plushie away but it'd cost Donghyuck two full evenings of babysitting his neighbour's bratty children (child _ren_ , plural. Satanic spawns, all of them, despite how sweet his neighbours themselves were). Also, the fox was really damn cute and keeping him was off the table because seeing it all the time would mean thinking of Renjun more often than necessary and he wasn't about to put himself through that pain when he had a whole musical to put together until early March.

So instead, the fox went on the four-hour train ride from Zurich to Paris while Donghyuck stayed back.

  
  


☀️

  
  


Renjun didn't come home for spring break either, nor did he visit during the summer because according to Jaemin there'd been a family emergency and he'd directly caught the first flight available that would bring him to Jilin. Donghyuck understood, of course he did.  
It was just that part of him had hoped that he'd finally get to see him, maybe ask for a kiss as a reward for graduating.

Instead, it was him and Jaemin and Yangyang sitting in the school's auditorium, side by side, waiting for the spectacular boom that would finally tie up their long six years at lyceum.  
It didn't happen, which was very disappointing. But Jeno, crescent-eyed and gentle-faced, awaited them outside the school gates with Jisung and Chenle.

Donghyuck looked away when Jaemin launched himself into his boyfriend's arms, tried to mimic Yangyang's cackle and pretended that he didn't want Renjun to be there with a burning passion.

  
  


☀️

  
  


Sometimes he wished he could just forget all of it. Never meet Renjun, never live through the four years he spent falling in love with him. He spent a year subsiding on second-hand information, ignoring any attempts Renjun made to reach out and get in touch because deep down it hurt to think that they could've had _something_ and instead had nothing at all.

"You're being petty and I'm not sure who you're trying to punish here," Jeno told him tiredly over ice cream (grapefruit and peppercorn, Donghyuck's new odd summer obsession).  
"I'm not punishing anyone. I'm trying to get over heartbreak," Donghyuck told him and bit resolutely into the waffle of his cone.  
He could tell he wasn't overly convincing.

  
  


☀️

  
  


It became easier as time went by. The pain didn't fade but it shifted and transformed until it eventually turned worn and almost comfortable. Comfortable enough to start liking some of his Instagram photos even though most of them were captioned in French now (ew).  
Comfortable enough to reach out privately again and start to tear down the wall that had formed between them as they'd grown apart.

It became easier but the dull ache never really quite subsided.  
_I wish I could just forget how to love you_ , he typed out in his chatbox. Renjun looked radiant on his newest WhatsApp profile picture, leaning against two other boys, no doubt friends he'd made in Paris.

He never sent the message off.  
Instead, he opened the group chat and typed _Gentlemen, who is going to take one for the team and help me set up Tinder?_

(Jaemin and Yangyang did.)

  
  


☀️

  
  


Here's what Donghyuck had hoped would happen: He'd meet a nice Someone Else who was very much unlike Renjun. They'd fall in love and be so disgustingly cute his friends would all start to retch at just how sugary sweet they were. And maybe, the vindictive part of him hoped, maybe Renjun would hear about or see it on social media and he'd feel a little wistful over what he had missed out on.

Here's what happened instead: he grew bored and annoyed with Tinder within three weeks and retired the app. Uni started and went from ' _oh, this is easier than expected_ ' to ' _when did the deadlines get this close_ ' a lot faster than he appreciated. He drunk-snogged Yangyang at a friend's birthday party and found himself wishing they both were with different people, which Donghyuck was very quick to follow up with a suffering thought about how he _really_ wished he could stop pining after someone who clearly didn't care anymore.

He made new friends within the media studies department's student association, amongst them Johnny Suh who was hard at work on his Master thesis project and whom Donghyuck had a silly crush on for two weeks because he was tall and kind and pretty hot. It felt a little like being fourteen all over again. And just like at fourteen he grew out of said crush quickly and comfortably to the point that when he saw Johnny get picked up by his lanky, bunny-faced boyfriend from the political sciences department he didn't feel much other than annoyance at how the two of them would flaunt how cute of a couple they were in front of the poor singles — the poor singles, in this case, meaning him.

"It's not going to work if you force it," Jeno told him from where he was sprawled out on the old, worn-out rug in his childhood bedroom. Despite having plenty of deadlines to get through himself he had apparently enough time to come home for the weekend to spend some time with his family and boyfriend. Donghyuck wished he could have some of that confident calm too.  
Through the open door the two of them could hear Jaemin working in the kitchen, humming along to a song on the radio like he hadn't been on the verge of a breakdown over his deadlines before Jeno had successfully distracted him with clamours for a dinner at an ungodly hour.

"I'm not forcing it," Donghyuck fought back, irritation bubbling up in his chest.  
"I'm moving on. That's healthy."  
"That's not moving on, though. That's you trying to put a band-aid on it and taking it off every time the wound starts to itch to try and scratch it."  
The comparison was uncomfortably accurate. It also made Donghyuck want to scratch his elbow for no good reason. 

"Renjun has moved on."

It was strange to say his name out loud and leave it in the middle of the room for it to be picked apart.  
Jeno didn't reply right away. The radiator stuttered in the background. Something clanged in the kitchen, interrupting Jaemin's humming for a moment.

"Did he tell you that?"  
"I haven't talked to Renjun in a really long time. Don't know how he'd tell me anything."

They closed the conversation at that and decided to go join Jaemin in the kitchen instead. Donghyuck begrudgingly accepted the thinly veiled message about how they _should_ talk without an excuse, for once.

  
  


☀️

  
  


He only found out Renjun had come back for his winter break when his departure date was practically imminent. Part of Donghyuck wanted to yell at Jaemin for not telling him but Jaemin was hours away in the Bernese mountains with his family and boyfriend and in a perfect position to pretend like he didn't have cell phone service. Maybe he _really_ didn't have cell phone service.

Then, there was a part of him that hoped that he could just trick himself into not caring. Renjun hadn't told him so clearly he hadn't cared. And crammed into the last corner of his mind the part of him that wanted to see him, even if it'd make him hurt and want to forget again reared its head.

This time his stubbornness ran out. Renjun hadn't told him, so clearly it was because his presence wasn't welcomed anyway.

(It stung extra hard when he opened his Instagram DMs for the first time in months the day after and found 25 new messages, 24 of them from Renjun ranging from _sorry I never replied, my phone broke down on me_ to _are you going to be home around Christmas_ to one last, defeated _Donghyuck?_ two weeks ago.)

  
  


☀️

  
  


If the autumn semester had been unexpectedly tricky to navigate it had nothing on the spring one. Now that the first year students were officially supposed to know how things at the Uni of Zurich worked (of course not taking into account that most of them, in fact, did not) the pace of his studies quickly picked up. Donghyuck found himself regretting having signed up for so many courses at once but a man had to be ambitious if he wanted to go places!  
What places exactly he didn't know yet, he hadn't put _that_ much thought into it.

"Only crazy people do 36 credits in one semester," Jeno told him on the phone when Donghyuck called him during a nocturnal nervous breakdown over a half-written essay that was due within the next ten hours. At least he had the grace to follow up his words with his proofreading. Even if it was three in the morning and he had his own assignments to get to.

Jaemin didn't seem to exist anymore outside of the Polytechnic Institute's architecture campus, which was too far away for Donghyuck to justify breezing over and abducting his friend to come have lunch with him. Yangyang spent most of his time in the German studies department's library and communicated in cursed memes only. And Jisung and Chenle both were busy with their own graduation theses to the point where they'd gotten into a fight last time Donghyuck had seen them. That in itself wouldn't have worried him (if any of them had the communication skill to figure out their fights, it was their youngest) if it didn't also mean that they both had to be under insane amounts of pressure. He didn't recall his own thesis being so messy but then again, he also had started repressing the stressful memories of last semester so maybe he really wasn't one to judge at all.

  
  


☀️

  
  


Donghyuck was still dreaming fitfully of his music theory final when a hand on his shoulder shook him awake.  
"You really shouldn't be sleeping out here," a voice chided. It was warm and honey-golden and comfortable in a way his exhaustion-addled brain couldn't put one and one together right away.  
"I sleep where I please," he proclaimed grumpily, swatting at the hand. It was small and callused and instead of leaving him to live his life in peace (like he deserved, goodness gracious) one of its index finger came up to nudge the tip of his nose instead.

"You'll catch a cold out here," the voice argued, amused. "Didn't Jaemin tell you to wait inside?"  
Donghyuck scrunched up his nose.  
"How d'you know what Jaemin told me?"

The voice laughed.  
"He told me, dumbass."

Maybe it was the cadence of it, maybe it was just that his slow, deadline-sick brain finally caught up with reality but the way the voice wrapped around the word _dumbass_ was so strikingly familiar and bright and warm that it finally, finally prompted him to sit up.

The sky was painfully blue. Donghyuck remembered sitting down on one of the stone benches by the main entrance, staring up at the plane trees partly shading him from the near-midday sunlight and thinking to himself he'd just close his eyes for a little bit. After his early morning exam he surely would've earned that right.

And for most of the part, the world looked exactly the same now, sitting up and, yes, indeed, feeling a little chilly, staring at one Huang Renjun.  
He looked a little stress-worn and a little older, his shoulders hunched over in that same way they'd always been when Donghyuck had waited for him to finish his art classes so they could spend their lunch period together during Renjun's last year at the lyceum.

"Hi," Renjun greeted. His voice had lost some of its brilliance, as if a cloud had covered his light and something tugged at the pit of Donghyuck's stomach. He wanted to scream and cry and noted with a resigned clarity how he wanted to kiss him a little bit too. Maybe a little bit much.  
"Hi," he echoed instead, hoping that his voice wouldn't let too much of his inner emotional turmoil show.

They spent a long moment staring at each other as the bustle of the courtyard around them picked up. Through an open window somewhere nearby they heard the bell ring, signalling the end of the morning classes.

"It's been a while," Donghyuck finally croaked. Renjun smiled apologetically.  
"Yeah. It has." He inhaled slowly, measuredly. As if he were stalling. Donghyuck hated himself for still being able to tell these things and how they still made his heart do weird and painful in his chest.

"I think I owe you an apology," Renjun continued. "I was actually really scared when I asked Jaemin if I could come surprise you. After… last winter I thought–"  
He cut off and swallowed thickly. Donghyuck watched the bob of his Adam's apple.  
"Well. Nevermind. But I wanted to make sure we'd get a chance to talk. At least _try_ to talk."  
Hands wringing on his lap Renjun looked down onto the stone bench they were both sitting on.  
"Things went really wrong and I wish they hadn't. I've been thinking about them a lot for the past two years."  
Once again silence stretched out between them, sticky like bubblegum. A breeze ruffled Renjun's hair, still dark brown like it had been on the day they'd last spoken face to face.  
"I wanted to ask if we could try again."

  
"Huh?"  
Now, Donghyuck knew that this wasn't his brightest answer but in his defence, he hadn't quite finished processing the fact that Renjun was here talking to him after two years of narrowly missing every opportunity they'd had to see each other, of no longer knowing how to properly talk without making it awkward.  
Two years of Donghyuck trying rather unsuccessfully to move on, telling himself that Renjun surely didn't care anymore. This was all a lot to take in.  
And despite the clumsiness of his reply Renjun's expression lightened. He laughed the same way he had before, summer sunshine golden yellow and orange, warm and from the heart. Donghyuck wondered if he had always been like this, as vibrant and gleaming, if this was something the two years had washed out until only a faded memory remained.

"I'm sorry," Renjun gasped between peals of laughter.  
"It's just– your face–"  
Donghyuck scrunched up his nose, twice in a row, just to be sure. Then, he smiled. He hadn't planned on it, really, it just happened. Unbidden, unexpectedly, unmistakably.

"I think we have a lot of catching up to do if we were to start over again," he slowly offered.  
The telltale laughter-shaking of Renjun's shoulders died down, the other boy's expression returning to a more serious one. Donghyuck mourned the loss of his smile for a moment.  
"I'd like that if you're okay with it too."

Donghyuck considered saying something that matched its earnest clarity, he really did. And then he opened his mouth, inhaled and replied: "Well, Huang Renjun, you better think about how to wine and dine me real quick."  
Renjun's eyes glinted at the challenge, as silly as it was and got back onto his feet. Then, he held out his hand to help Donghyuck up.  
"Well, there's a challenge if I ever heard one."

  
  


☀️

  
  


Donghyuck finally kissed Renjun for the first time on the first Tuesday of his semester break, the two of them waiting in the hot June sun for their friends by the ice cream parlour just in front of the Central Library. The wind rustled the leaves overhead and not too far away, where the Limmat split Old Town Zurich from its main station they could hear the gulls cry.  
He tasted a little bit like sunshine.

"You think this was worth the two-year wait?" Renjun whispered against his lips after pulling away? Donghyuck didn't answer right away, in part because he didn't know yet and in part because the only thing better than teasing Renjun apparently was kissing him and, well. They weren't kissing right now, were they?

His silence got him a playful yet deceptively strong slap to his bicep.  
"Answer me, you heathen!" Renjun complained dramatically.

Donghyuck did not, in fact, answer, at least not with words. Instead, he chose to wrap his arms around his now-boyfriend ( _the thought of it felt a little like sunshine too_ ) and kissed him again.

**Author's Note:**

>   * lyceum crash course in hopefully simple and easy to understand terms: elementary school can be followed up by either secondary school or lyceum, with secondary school. donghyuck & co. took the lyceum route where you take an exam to enter the lyceum of your choice and then spend years 7 & 8 taking basic courses and 9-12 in specialized ones. i simplified that as "majors" bc the concept of uni majors is fairly similar, options include natural sciences, music and fine arts, modern and ancient languages (latin and greek) and economy and law though i think bigger schools sometimes also offer philosophy and psychology majors.
>   * to graduate from lyceum you do your own project and a short paper on it. for the lack of a better word i just went with "thesis" but it's not quite on the same level as it would be at uni.
>   * swiss kids learn french from grades 5 up to the point where you should technically graduate with a b2 (/c1 if you're really good) proficiency level – which is, coincidentally, also the minimum requirement to study in france.
>   * funny enough, most people i know didn't enjoy french in school. at all. hence donghyuck's casual "ew" somewhere in there.
>   * the school year starts in august but cut-off dates for classes are between april and july (it changes every year, for the sake of this story i set it sometime in may because that was when my high school class' cut-off date was) which is why the 00 liners born before this nebulous day were in the same year as mark!
>   * the legal drinking age here is sixteen for beer and wine and 18 for hard liquor. hence, underage legal drinking.
>   * donghyuck's university major is media studies, his minor is in music theory, yangyang's is german studies, jaemin's is architecture. i don't actually know what jeno or mark major in.
>   * "only crazy people do 36 credits in one semester" is a statement jeno makes with my full endorsement.
>   * that ice cream parlour by the central library is really nice. can recommend. second-best ice cream i've had in the city. it's a bit pricey but then again, everything in zurich is.
> 

> 
> find me on: [twitter](http://twitter.com/lovecherriemoji) / [cc](https://curiouscat.me/lovecherriemotion)


End file.
